BHUBANESWAR, Sept. 17: The “uproar” rather than the “roar” brought the top wildlife officers out of their “den” to explain at length that it was highly speculative and presumptuous to say anything on the tiger population at Simlipal Tiger Reserve.
The principal conservator of forests and chief wildlife warden, Orissa, Mr SC Mohanty and other top forest and wildlife officers, for the first time, addressed a Press conference here today to highlight the status of Simlipal Tiger Reserve.
Simlipal has been ranked as one of the highest rated parks in the country by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Switzerland which is the world’s largest and most important conservation organisation spread over 181 countries.
The recently released report on evaluation of tiger reserves of India, Simlipal has been ranked in the highest category.
The study carried out in 28 tiger parks in India across 17 states is based on a scoring system of 45 relevant parameters. Based on the scoring, eight parks, including Simlipal, have been ranked as very good, 11 as good, seven in satisfactory and two in the poor categories. Similipal has been awarded 140 out of a maximum of 180 points and ranked seventh in India. The study focuses on the management of the parks and is a proof of the high standards of conservation management practices undertaken over the years. Needless to say that better managed parks will have better tiger numbers, the indications and evidences so far are very encouraging, noted Mr Mohanty.
With regard to tiger census, he said the census based on pug marks had been designed and developed in Orissa and adopted by the entire country. Census figures over the years had shown a rising trend since 2000 and the last one of 2004 had revealed the presence of 101 tigers in Simlipal.
However, nationwide the shift has been to a more comprehensive methodology by the WII which is now in progress and will be completed next year, he added.
He claimed that poaching of tigers had stopped in Simlipal and even the tribal practice of mass hunting had been checked over the past three years.
A three-day intensive search for tiger signs to estimate the number of tigers was undertaken in Simlipal in January 2006 during which 927 leopard evidences and 738 tiger signs were recorded. Evidences and signs include pug marks, scat or tiger dung, direct sighting, scratch marks which form the basis of estimation of the number of animals in a particular park. This is the preliminary phase of the technique adopted for monitoring tigers from 2005. In tiger intensive areas, the collection of evidences is followed by the setting up of camera traps. The fact that a camera trap team from the Wild Life Institute of India is presently in Simlipal, is an endorsement that the tiger population is high in the park, he said.
